With Both Feet (and One Slightly Gimpy Hip)

Last week's running: 21 miles
Fundraising total as of 3/1: $600 (and holding--my massive letter-writing campaign kicks into gear next week!)

So if you know me (and you do), you know that I have a hard time doing anything halfway. I leave the country for the first time and live in Africa for two years. I have a tender moment with a baby chick and give up meat for 2.5 years. I meet a girl and move to Memphis with her (and marry her, obviously). You get the idea.

Now that I've decided to semi-retire from soccer and get into running a little more seriously, I've jumped in with both feet. I've logged quite a few miles since I got back in the game (75 last month), some at a pretty accelerated pace (got my first run under 8 min/mile last week!) and for the most part my body's responded well--I haven't found that I've lacked energy or had too many injury issues during the runs themselves.

Well, wouldn't you know it, it's caught up to me a little bit. In last week's storm (the one that knocked out power to a good chunk of NH and made Saturday's long run, well, a ton of fun), I figured that my gym would be closed for my usual Friday cross-training, so I decided to go out on a relatively easy run--4 miles, pretty light, no big deal. Later on that day, my hip started to flare up a little bit. I got through Saturday's 7 miles fine, but it's definitely a reminder that (a) running a marathon doesn't happen overnight and (b) I'm not 18 anymore. My 30-something body, as healthy as it seems to be most of the time, doesn't recover like it used to, so I've gotta scale back a little bit if that's what my body's telling me.

So tomorrow, I'm thinking I'll mix it up a bit. We'll start with an easy mile to warmup (on the treadmill--nice, flat surface), then play in the student-faculty basketball game (where I'm at least good for running up and down the court). Then we'll see how it goes from there. This definitely isn't a deal-breaker, but definitely a helpful reminder to chill out a bit.